[noiseman]

I’ve been to Morocco and was impressed at seeing a Christian church across the street from a mosque, and both a short distance from a synagogue, yet everyone gets along. We were told by a local that Morocco’s constitution mandates tolerance for all monotheistic religions. Morocco also has a long history of being friendly toward the United States.

In recent years, they’ve had some issues with Islamic terrorism, but the king has crushed it when it pops up. He has also been working hard to make Morocco a tourist destination. We were in Tangier, and the Berber people in that area were very friendly. I think the Berbers moderate any tendency they might otherwise have toward anti-western terrorist tendencies. With its close proximity to Spain, Tangier is also a very international city, with as much European influence as there is from Islam.

I really enjoyed visiting there.

[Vigilanteman]

King Mohammed VI also invited American troops to "visit" his country at the height of World War II. Some of the opening scenes of the epic movie Patton document the visit.

Morroco's brand of Islam is mainly the Shafi'i school of Sunni Islam, the smallest and most tolerant (or least intolerant) main branch of Sunni. The Shafi'i are that elusive moderate brand of Islam the media always gush about, but they are a majority only in Morocco, the UAE and Brunei. They are also a significant minority in a handful of other places in the Maghreb, Qatar and southwest Asia, including Indonesia and Bangladesh.